Hi Abhimanyu,

Windows 7 does include a lot of revisiona to the kernel, wheather this classifies as the fabled "minwin" is open for debate

If you have an hour to spare you can here the facts from Microsoft themselves in this video ...

Mark Russinovich: Inside Windows 7 | Going Deep | Channel 9

As far as I know, to increase backwards compatibility, Windows 7 will have a version number of 6.1.xxxx where xxxx is the build number.

Thanks for the info Nigel

Hi DiamondNRG,

I think the retention of the 6.1.xxxx will certainly cause some more advanced users to consider Windows 7 as an update, It already has in fact with some of the less well informed bloggers out there.

The thing is that it's not the more advanced users, (like the vast number of our members here), that Microsoft have to convince to go out and install Windows 7, but the IT managers and "normal" home users, The these groups the OOB (out of box) experience is extremely important. The more applications that Windows runs without having to use any compatibility tool the better the "just works" impression is - and that sells!

A lot of the blame for the need for this stratagy would have to be leveled at the programmers of 3rd part applications who specify an actual revision number when they check for compatibility, (if they check for greater than 6, then it will work as M$ intended - if it works on Vista It'll work on Windows 7 )

Whether the fixing of the acceptable version number is done for the sake of upgrade sales, (New OS - New Application?), or or just by less than elegent programming, I don't know, but it is of course Microsoft which takes the blame.

Microsoft publishes guidlines for this type of thing unfortunanely some 3rd parties choose to ignore this advice, even to the level that even a service pack will "break" things"

Hope this helps to explain things as I see them

Hello, DiamondNRG,

the same sort of thing is responsible for a lot of the flak that the UAC got in Vista, Microsoft specified in NT3.5 that applications should be written to work with a standard user account. How many programmers decided not to follow that one because it was a more difficult option It also didn't help the security of the system to have so much running with admin privilege

I had a user with a problem the other day and it turns out that their desktop publisher has to be run as admin

DiamondNRG said:

Yeah that makes sense. I just wish Microsoft would for once say, if your software does not work on our OS because they did not follow our guidelines then you should use a different product and it is not your OS' fault!

Actually, I believe Microsoft does say something similar to that. The trouble is, too many people turn around and lay the blame on Microsoft, saying that the OS is bad because their applications don't work properly.

While I may not be a professional programmer, I have been using Delphi long enough to know that a great many bugs in any given project are primarily caused by my code not following the rules, or because I took shortcuts.

But it's never the developers fault! People have been blaming Microsoft for so long, they forgotten how to take responsibility for their own shortcomings.